Back from Norway...After Action Report


TreeStandBowHunter

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Well folks, I have returned from the land of Eskimos grin.gif We actually came back 3 days early due to transcomm doing the flight schedules.

Well, we left on the 23rd from Westover AFB near Springfield,MA. We headed up to New Foundland than over to Ireland and then finally into Trondhiem,Norway. After we arrived, we stayed at a Norweigien Army base near the airport. We stayed there for about 3 days to wait for other units to show up and do the planning.

We then headed north to Narvik. COLD COLD COLD is about the only thing I can say. Night time temps were anywhere from -10 to -30. For the most time, we stayed warm with our clothing that was issued to us. But the mornings were the worst. We stayed in 4 man tents (only 2 Marines per tent) but the tents provided no warmth only a wind blocker. We slepped on snow pretty much. I bought a Therma Rest before we left...I am glad I did. So anyway, we jumped about 3 times going further north each time. We would set up our Command and Control and relocate every few days or so.

At the end of the exercise, we returned to Trondhiem to the Norwegien Army base to begin our retrograde planning not to mention a little free time out in the city of trondhiem...but we won't get into that grin.gif

Over all, good trip. The country of Norway is awsome. Beutiful scenery and nice people. I would go into more details but I am tired and I am still awake from when we got up this morning to leave Norway. I coundn't sleep on the plane because of too much turbulance. If this thread is still alive tomorrow, I will go into more details.

Enjoy the photos. Too tired to explain them. Oh, BTW...we seen Reindeer and Moose.

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Re: Back from Norway...After Action Report

OK, back in the saddle here. Norway was cool actually. Too expensive though. They have a 24% sales tax shocked.gif. I didn't buy much. I bought my wife a Troll and I bought my kids a little something. Trolls and Vikings are really big over that way. Our night out in Trondheim was pretty cool. I stayed sober while the others drank thereselves into oblivion. I am sure the Norweigens are glad that we are out of there though grin.gif.

Trondheim has a temperature almost like Boston though which is pretty weird. You would think that it would be colder seeing how Norway is up so high. Now when we moved north to do the actual Field Ex, then it was pretty cold. Another weird one is we stopped in Iceland coming back to the states for a few hours. Iceland is for the most part green except for the high mountains. We flew over Greenland after our stop and it was all white. Go figure that out will ya. I sure can't.

Anway, its good to be back on US Soil. Got to meet alot of folks from different countries militaries. The French never showed up but I know Canada was there along with about 10 other countries.

Skiing of course is big over there. They don't use salt on there roads....at least not from what I seen. Very few people live there and all the houses are pretty much 1 of 4 colors. Red being the big color.

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Re: Back from Norway...After Action Report

Welcome back Mike, I hope those ham and cheese omelets kept the guys warm over there. grin.gif Sorry, couldn't resist.

[ QUOTE ]

We flew over Greenland after our stop and it was all white. Go figure that out will ya. I sure can't.

[/ QUOTE ]

As far as the following goes, if memory serves me correctly from World History class way back when the Vikings discovered Iceland and Greenland, they so named the countries because well, Greenland was a big block of ice and by naming it Greenland they figured it would keep everybody from coming to the nice green hospitable land they had found that they subsequently named Iceland in hopes of keeping people away. Thats the story I heard anyway.

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